Can you tell if your job is in jeopardy? Would you know the signs? We all like to think we would, but thousands of employees are blindsided by layoffs, reorganizations and downsizings every day. There are millions on unemployment right now that most likely never thought they would be the one left holding a pink slip.

Your career is in danger right now. Simply because you have no way of knowing what to look for. No way of finding the true agendas that determine whether you are seen as an asset or a risk.

Do you know what opinions your company has of you right now? Those opinions are actively determining your job security. Those opinions are built on the secret agendas within your company. You need to know what they are before it’s too late.

This chapter reveals the secret methods used to manage out unwanted workers such as cleaning house layoffs, underhandedly managing an employee out, and making an illegal firing appear legal. If a company wants you out, there is always a way they can maneuver around the law. This chapter will tell you what to look for, and how to save your job.

Employees make career-threatening mistakes every day. What you don’t realize is that your company will never tell you when you’ve made one of these mistakes for fear of legal exposure. Since an employee is much less likely to sue if he thinks the job loss was not his fault, companies spin the rhetoric we’ve all heard: “we’ve had to reorganize your department,” “we just can’t afford to keep you on right now,” or “we’ve decided to go in a different direction and are eliminating your position.” Those lines are rarely the truth.

The truth is: your company knows exactly why some employees are kept while others are let go, and now it’s your turn to learn those same secrets.

First, you need to know what you’re REALLY up against.

Many employees falsely believe the law will provide them with protection from retaliatory or unfounded job loss. In many of today’s workplaces, this is nothing but a false sense of security.

With all their expensive attorneys and consultants, most companies have found many pathways and gray areas around an employee’s “legal rights.”

Companies have learned to protect themselves fiercely from those they feel are “out of alignment” with what they value. If unfavorable judgments and opinions are allowed to progress, they can take you from someone the company has interest in, to sentencing you to the sidelines, all the way to full persona-non-grata. Yes, companies do have “black lists.”

One of a Human Resource Department’s secret objectives is to remove these unwanted employees while legally protecting the company. And most are very good at it. There are ways a company can remove you so you never knew what hit you or what you did that cost you your job!

Companies don’t say "your fired!" anymore; it’s too risky to be that up-front. The removal process is now much more subtle. You need to know what these tactics are so you can tell when you’re career might be in jeopardy.

Managing an employee “OUT”:

One of the preferred methods of removal is the one no one talks about: “managing an employee out.” It can provide the most protection for a company with the least amount of paperwork.

The basic concept is simple: make the employee’s work life so difficult and unsatisfying he leaves on his own. If the company can get an undesirable employee to quit, they won’t have to deal with the complexities, costs and potential liabilities of firing him. No severance, no unemployment issues, little or no potential for liability. Most employees never see this one coming because in many companies it has become an art.

The signs are always there, if you look for them. Too many employees keep their head in the sand because they don’t want to believe their company could lose interest in them. That’s a good recipe for being blindsided with job loss.

Here are just a few signs that you might be in the process of being managed out...

This secret continues with:

• The 7 danger signs of being managed out
• True "managed out" horror stories
• Making an illegal firing appear "legal"
• The myth of "performance improvement"
• The 6 danger signs of being laid-off
• What to do when the writing's on the wall